About

I have been married for 28 years to my awesome husband Tom. We have two sons. Dylan is an adult, living his best life. Joshua is in high school being homeschooled by none other than me. We moved to Texas on Christmas Eve 2012, from Oregon. It was a huge change and we knew absolutely no one in Houston. But God provided everything we needed, and we love living here. I wouldn’t have picked Texas, actually I begged God not to move us to Texas. Yet here we are years later, and happy where we are. God knew.

I wrote about Joey because God asked me to many years ago. It all started with my husband Tom’s idea for an illustrated children’s book using a character he created many years ago. When we were newly married Tom showed me his drawing of this character. I was very encouraging and told him to go for it, thinking that my role was to be the supportive wife. I had zero desire to write. Never dreamed of it. Never, ever wanted to write anything. One day while praying about Tom’s book idea God said to me, “Just write the story”. He repeated that to me many times over and over again for several days. I was in disbelief that God would tell me to write. This was Tom’s dream, not mine. “I am not a writer, I don’t want to write, I don’t know how,” I told God. I kept what God said to me deep inside. I thought for sure others would think I was crazy, and I wasn’t entirely convinced this was God’s plan for me.

Fast forward to 2010 when I finally got the courage to write, after wrestling with God for years. I started writing in a spiral notebook during that first summer and continued in that notebook for several years. I’d write for a couple of hours in the morning and God would give me ideas, and characters, and everything. He did it all, I just showed up. Many times I didn’t want to write. It was too hard for me. Fear would grip me, and I would question what I was doing and why. “No one will read this, I’m not a good writer, I’m wasting my time, God should pick a better writer, better Christian, anyone but me,” would fill my head. Then faith would show up to crush the fear, and tell me to do what God asked of me. I had to completely rely on Him to accomplish this overwhelming task, and that’s what He wanted. I wouldn’t have chosen me, but God did.

Listen to my interview with Kid’s Stuff Podcast where I share more details of what inspired me to write.

• Kid’s Stuff Podcast recently changed formats to Spotify. You need a Spotify account to listen to the interview. Click on the Spotify icon to log on.